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The things kids ask

You never know what kind of weird conversations can come up, especially when children are involved. Lately, we've been watching a lot of animal documentaries at my house.

Mattie wants to be a veterinarian when she grows up, so anytime she can learn something new about animals, she's excited. We've been watching a steady stream of animal documentaries.

A show called "Kitten Rescuers" on Netflix has really brought on some fun conversations. It takes place in London and follows officers of the RSPCA, that's the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. They get calls about stray and injured cats, as well as households that have huge cat colonies.

While it's cute to see all the kittens, the shows about huge colonies have helped illustrate why we don't need any more cats.

Last night, we were watching episode 7, just before bedtime. Eric had been called out to work, so it was just us girls. That turned out to be a good thing when the show aired a spay surgery.

Mattie was entranced but a little concerned when the vet began talking about organs that humans have too. So we had to pause, explain the differences and that humans don't get spayed.

Eric got home long after Mattie went to bed. He said he was delighted to have missed that conversation.

You never know what kids are going to ask at any given time. And now that she's older, the questions are more technical. More gathering information that can be stored in her brain and used later.

When she was little, the questions were a whole lot more interesting. Like when she was 6 and kept asking me what my bird Spike was saying, every time he made a noise.

He didn't speak words, just a complex system of whistles and imitated laughter. I don't know why she thought I could "speak his language," but she did. And at first, I played along, telling her he wanted a snack or wanted to be put down.

Eventually, after getting the "what's he saying?" question about 8 times in 30 minutes, I started coming up with silly answers, hoping she'd stop. Like "he wants to know why you want to know" and "it's all weird bird stuff."

If I had had any child-rearing experience at the time, I would have known this would have the opposite effect I intended. All it did was encourage her to ask the question more and even begin applying the question elsewhere.

Aubrey's cat, Ninja, would meow for his dinner, and Mattie would ask what he was saying. Before long, our pets were having full-on conversations, using me as a translator. If you ask Mattie, that is.

When she was 7, Mattie once asked me what I Googled when I was a little girl.

When I said Google didn't exist, she asked if there were dinosaurs. It took me fully 30 seconds of staring in shock to realize that in her 7-year-old mind, there were two points in history: Current events and dinosaurs. She actually seemed disappointed to learn dinosaurs were gone long before I was born. I sometimes wonder if she thought my childhood was something like "The Flintstones" but then I remember that she's never seen the show.

Kate Cook is city editor for the Herald-Citizen. Her email address is kate.cook@herald-citizen.com.